Masako Miki creates larger-than-life-size, felt-covered forms drawn from the Japanese folk belief in yokai (shape-shifters) who can disguise themselves in any number of different forms. Miki creates the semi-abstract, sculptural forms utilizing brilliant colors and sets them into a magical environment suggesting another reality. The installation moves from the three-dimensional forms to abstract images on the floor and walls, conveying a sense of expanding boundaries.MORE about Masako Miki / MATRIX 273

Niloufar Salehi is an Assistant Professor in Berkeley's School of Information. Her research centers on social computing, technologically mediated collective action, digital labor, and more broadly, human-computer-interaction (HCI). At Jacobs, she'll discuss her research on how computing platforms can support collective efforts for social change. MORE about Design Field Notes — Niloufar Salehi

This talk focuses on the divided Poland that emerged after World War I. On the one hand, Poland had to accommodate the demands of generations of freedom fighters, while on the other, it quickly became a dysfunctional democracy that lapsed into authoritarian rule after 1926, opening spaces for xenophobia and discrimination against Jews. The state arrested fascists, and in the late 1930s became a place of modest hopes for reform and where the government, with overwhelming support of the population, became the first to say no to Hitler’s expanding rule. With John Connelly, history professor, UC Berkeley.MORE about Poland Reborn: A State Between Democracy and Fascism

Lunch Poems presents Tarfia Faizullah, author of Registers of Illuminated Villages and Seam. She is the winner of numerous awards and her poems are published widely in periodicals and anthologies.MORE about Lunch Poems — Tarfia Faizullah